


Material Girl

by OscarTheSlouch



Category: Marvel 616, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Artist Steve Rogers, Asgardian Liquor (Marvel), Asgardian Magic (Marvel), Avengers Tower, Bearded Steve Rogers, Catholic Steve Rogers, Drunk Tony, Established Relationship, Gender or Sex Swap, Halloween, Halloween Costumes, JARVIS - Freeform, Karaoke, M/M, Magic and Science, Medical Doctor Bruce Banner, Medical Examination, PBS pledge drive, POV Alternating, Superhusbands (Marvel), Tony Stark Still Has Arc Reactor, Transformation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-05
Updated: 2020-10-06
Packaged: 2021-03-08 00:40:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26816737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OscarTheSlouch/pseuds/OscarTheSlouch
Summary: Tony hadn’t hesitated when he’d been offered the bottle from the pouch at Sif's waist. Lady Thor was a knockout, built like a brick house with gold hair to the waist.“A great beauty!” Thor declared, pulling him into a bathroom so Tony could look at himself in a mirror. Tony ran a finger along the delicate point of his chin, the new pout of his lips, the silken arch of his eyebrow. His features had transmogrified nicely into something not unlike Vivian Leigh: sharp, sly, and feline. He had a vision of Steve’s big hands around his new, tiny curve of waist, the fingers spread wide across Tony’s soft skin.Tony strode out of the bathroom, feeling both aroused and pleased with himself, his two favorite feelings. He decided he needed a grand entrance, something that would make Steve’s heart stop. That was just about the time he noticed the karaoke machine.“Hey, hey,” he snagged the elbow of a passing pin-up girl with bright red lips, “can I borrow your lipstick?”Which was how he had ended up here, lips slathered in Ruby Woo, watching Captain America hyperventilating on the floor of an elevator, and realizing with a dawning horror that he had royally, majorly, seriously fucked up.
Relationships: Bruce Banner & Steve Rogers, Bruce Banner & Tony Stark, Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 2
Kudos: 21





	1. Who's That Girl?

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this well before Madonna's very bad pandemic takes. For the record, I do not endorse anti-science quackery. Or weird bathtub videos. The number of chapters is an estimate based on the loose outline I have in my head, so take it with a grain of salt.
> 
> Anyway, now presenting for your quarantine pleasure: Tony making Very Bad Decisions at a Halloween party.

Part 1: Who’s That Girl?

6:40 pm. The Penthouse. Halloween.

Steve sat on the bed eating a bowl of cornflakes. It was the only place to eat. The kitchen was full of catering staff, and he’d been hounded out of the living room by the party decorator’s crew of professional cob-webbers. It was really something, the way some people made a living these days. He would bet his last dollar there hadn’t been a single professional cob-web hanger in all of New York in 1945. Steve ate his cereal wistfully, if such a thing could be done, and recalled a time when all you needed for a Halloween party was a pumpkin and a tub of apples.

“Hey, Cap? You in here?” Tony cracked open the door, sticking his head in, “Pep told me you were hiding out with a bowl of cereal. You want blinis? Or shrimp? There’s tons of party food in the kitchen. I’ll steal a plate for you.”

“No, thanks. I don’t think seafood pairs well with cornflakes.” 

“You plan on getting dressed? The party starts in twenty minutes.”

“I am dressed.”

“Yeah? And what are you supposed to be?” Tony made a sweeping up-down motion with his hand at Steve’s clothes: plaid shirt, khakis, and loafers. 

“Comfortable?” Steve knew it wouldn’t fly; Tony was already making a face.

”No costume, no candy, young man. Those are the rules.” 

“Tony, I spend my whole life in a costume. Can’t I just be comfortable at the party?”

“It’s a costume party, Steve. A _costume_ party.” Tony swept all the way into the room and disappeared promptly into the walk-in closet. Steve could hear drawers opening and closing, hangers scraping along closet rods. There was a series of thumps, and then Tony re-emerged, dumping a small pile onto the bed: Steve’s hiking boots, suspenders, and a knit cap. “Put those on. You’re a lumberjack.”

“A lumberjack?”

“Sure. You’ve got that ridiculous beard, make it earn its keep. Come on, Steve, don’t be an asshole. Only assholes go to costume parties in street clothes.”

“What about you?” Tony looked impeccable in his black three-piece suit, but his only obvious nod to the occasion was a pocket square patterned with tiny bats.

“Oh,” Tony opened his mouth wide and pointed to his teeth. In place of his usual canines, there was a set of porcelain fangs. “I’m a vampire,” he said, by way of explanation.

“Shouldn’t you have a cape or something?”

Tony rolled his eyes, “No, Steve. Get with the program. Vampires don’t wear capes. They haven’t worn capes in decades. Vampires are now strictly sexy. And occasionally sparkly.”

“If you say so,” Steve said, and set his empty bowl and spoon on a bedside table. He sighed and began to tug off his shoes, shaking his head ruefully. Here he was, voluntarily taking off his very comfortable loafers so he could clomp around the apartment all night in hiking boots. At least Tony was mollified. Steve stood up to pull on the suspenders.

“You’re a good sport, Cap,” Tony said approvingly.

“Thanks. I hope I get some kind of points for this,” he replied, tugging on the hat. It itched.

“Oh, you’re earning mad points. You know,” Tony sidled over, close enough that Steve could smell his aftershave, “you make a very strapping mountain man.” He trailed a finger across Steve’s chest, hooking it under a suspender, “Maybe later I’ll let you log my wood.” He let the suspender snap back to Steve’s chest, “If you know what I mean.”

“That,” Steve laughed, “was _awful._ ” 

“And yet,” Tony pressed his palm to Steve’s groin, “still somehow effective. Must be my boyish charm. Would sex count as points, by the way?” He squeezed gently at the semi-hard bulge in Steve’s pants and smiled, looking pleased with himself.

“Tony?” Pepper appeared in the open doorway, throwing cold water over the scene. She was clearly irritable and, in her witch’s hat, she looked ready to hex someone. “I need you out here. The DJ is late, and we’re already low on alcohol. It’s,” she glanced over her shoulder, her voice dropping to a furious whisper, “it’s the Asgardians. Again.”

“God damn it,” Tony threw up his hands, “I told them the bar was humans only. After New Year’s, those drunks are strictly BYOB. Alright, Pep. I’ll handle it. I’ll march their happy asses back across the Bifrost on a liquor run if I have to.”

Pepper nodded, her mouth pressed into a tight line, and scurried out, probably to deal with some other disaster. Steve suspected that Pepper did not actually enjoy their parties. He didn’t blame her. Even though Tony was the team’s official party planner, he was, by his own admission, more of an “ideas man” than an executor. Meaning, of course, that Tony spit-balled suggestions and Pepper did all the actual work.

“Alright, Grizzly Adams,” Tony sighed. He stood on his toes and gave Steve a peck on the mouth, “Duty calls. I gotta go keep Pepper from turning someone into a newt. See ya on the dance floor.”

**************************************************

The party started at seven, and Tony had assured Steve that everyone would be gone by eleven. Twelve at the latest. According to Steve’s watch, it was now 11:30, and somewhere in the last half-hour, the party had slipped noisily past full-swing and into full-on rager. From his perch on the penthouse’s second floor balcony, he had a terrific view of the madness ensuing in the living room below. For example, there was Clint, in the corner next to the bar, wearing a stupid headband that made it look like he had an arrow shot straight through his temples, playing darts with a mummy. The mummy was winning, so Steve figured it had to be Kate. Natahsa was doing a headstand on the bar, balancing two shots of vodka on the points of her high heels. And, of course, there was Tony, drink hoisted above his head, dancing in the middle of the scrum. So, technically, Steve _had_ seen Tony on the dance floor—just from a distance. There was no way in hell he was going down there, and Steve wasn’t a great dancer anyway. Still, Tony seemed to be having a good time.

“Some party,” Bruce slid up quietly beside him, folding his arms on the balcony rail. He eyed Steve up and down, then asked, “Lumberjack?”

“Yeah. Tony said I had to go as something. What’re you?”

“Um, mad scientist? I guess?” Bruce gestured vaguely at his lab coat, “I had a beaker earlier, but now I think Nat might be drinking out of it.”

“It was clean, right?”

Bruce shrugged.

There was a crash from below and the sound of breaking glass. Bruce tensed, but Steve placed a steadying hand on his forearm. “It’s alright. Volstagg just smashed a glass,” Steve pointed to the group of roaring Asgardians. “I should get a broom before someone steps on the pieces.” But before Steve could make a move towards the stairs, a second glass, this one lobbed by Sif, exploded against the wall.

“If I were you,” Bruce said mildly, “I’d just wait. They’ll just keep doing it. Oh, and look, Tony’s got it.”

They watched Tony shove his way through the crowd. He looked diminutive next to the Asgardians when he finally made it across the room. Now, he was jabbing a finger in Thor’s face and gesticulating with his cup. There was some animated but inaudible back and forth, and then Tony abruptly downed his drink in one long swallow. He held up his empty cup theatrically before hurling it at the wall. When it bounced off harmlessly onto the floor, there was an eruption of cheers from the assembled Norsemen. Volstagg clapped Tony on the back so hard it nearly knocked him down.

“I guess they don’t have plastic cups in Asgard,” Steve commented, watching as they hoisted Tony up onto their shoulders.

“No,” Bruce agreed, “I guess not. Think they’d do that to me if I gave them a paper plate?--Oh. Uh oh.”

“‘Uh-oh’ what?” Steve craned over the railing as Tony’s new group of admirers disappeared (with Tony) under the edge of the balcony, “Did they drop him?”

“No, but I think they’re plying him with alien alcohol. Thor handed him a flask.”

“Well,” Steve sighed, “it’ll be his hangover.”

**************************************************

At midnight, the DJ was displaced by a karaoke machine. From their elevated vantage point, Steve and Bruce watched a string of unidentifiable ghosts, zombies, and costumed superheroes sing a series of unidentifiable songs. Well, unidentifiable to Steve at least.

“What was that supposed to be?” Steve asked, wincing, as an eye-patched pirate closed his number with a warbling sour note.

“In theory? Frank Sinatra,” Bruce said, shaking his head, “In practice, though--”

The next song started: driving drums and frothy synthesizer. The crowd erupted in laughter and catcalls as the singer took the stage.

“Seems like everybody knows this one,” Steve remarked.

“Madonna.” 

Steve nodded politely, assuming that ‘Madonna,’ in this context, must be something other than “Virgin Mary, Mother of Christ,” and placed the name in his ever-expanding mental file of twentieth century pop-culture.

A woman took the stage, sweeping the microphone out of the stand with a grin and a wink. She was small and trim, with loose waves of dark hair and a swipe of bright lipstick. Steve wasn’t sure about her costume: Charlie Chaplin maybe, only without the bowler and cane. Whatever it was, it looked incomplete, as though she had shed some of its pieces over the course of the night. Now, she was down to a vest, baggy trousers, and a shirt with the sleeves rolled up to her elbows, exposing her fragile-looking wrists and forearms. Actually, she was sort of small and fragile-looking all over, but she controlled the stage masterfully: strutting up and down, kicking up a flirty heel here and there, reaching down a slim hand towards the crowd. When she began to sing, her voice was controlled, but high and breathy. 

“Is she good?” Steve half-shouted over the approving roar, “I can’t tell.”

“Well,” Bruce half-shouted back, “she sounds a lot like Madonna. For what that’s worth.” 

Despite her reedy voice, the audience clearly loved her and pressed in close to the edge of the DJ’s platform. Steve remembered crowd energy like this during the war, rowdy and aroused. The servicemen had never given _him_ this reception, of course, but some of the girls could make even the most battle-hardened marine units eat from their hands. He remembered one girl in particular, Carole the Carrot-top. She was pretty enough, though not quite beautiful, and shorter than the other girls by at least two inches, but there was something about her—the sway in her hips, the tease in her smile—that whipped whole crowds of men into a frenzy.

Just like this fire-cracker was whipping them now. When she reached the chorus, something about material girls or material worlds or maybe both, Steve thought they might mob the stage. She was magnetic; even Steve could not take his eyes off of her. And when she threw her head back, exposing the white column of her throat, and let loose a string of orgasmic little yips, Steve felt each one in the pit of his stomach. Or maybe somewhere lower. In any case, she made him squirm. He leaned towards Bruce, “What’s she supposed to be?” 

“Vampire.”

“A what?” Steve laughed, confused.

“She’s a vampire. When the chorus comes back around, the—the yapping part—you can see her fangs.” Steve could feel his face freezing, morphing from smile to rictus. 

“Steve,” Bruce’s expression was wary, “is something wro--?” But Steve urgently shushed him. She was back to the chorus now, throwing her head back again, her hair a dark tumble around her shoulders. As she started to bark, her top lip pulled back from her gleaming teeth. In place of canines, she had a set of sharp little fangs. Steve . . . Steve knew those fangs. And, with a dawning horror, he realized that he also knew those trousers and that vest and, now that he was really looking, he also knew that smile, and those dark eyes.

Something heavy dropped into Steve’s stomach, and, by the end of the bridge, Steve had made it to the bottom of the stairs and was pushing none-too-gently through the sea of party guests. 

As the last verse began, Steve made it to the short flight of stairs on stage right to wait for Tony’s exit. He willed himself to be calm, to relax his balled fists. He recognized the almost overwhelming urge to grab Tony by the shoulders and shake him (her?), but he wouldn’t give in to it. Steve took a deep breath, exhaling noisily through his gritted teeth as the song bounced towards its conclusion. 

Center-stage, Tony was standing with his back to the audience, singing coyly over one narrow shoulder as he delivered his final note. It was met with a chaos of hoots and applause, and he smiled brightly. As he turned to exit the platform and caught Steve’s eye, the smile turned incandescent. He practically skipped off-stage. Steve wasn’t sure how to take it.

“Hey, Grizzly Adams,” Tony said blithely. Liquor fumes were positively pouring off of him; the stuff was eking from his pores, but, Tony being Tony and a champion drunk, his alien voice was marked only by the subtlest slur. “I was pretty good, right?” It was clear from Tony’s tone that it wasn’t really a question. “It’s amazing, isn’t it? The way you remember the songs from when you were a kid? I still knew all the words, and I didn’t even--hey!” 

Steve grabbed Tony’s elbow--an elbow that felt very small and fragile in his hand--and dragged him towards the elevator. Steve shoved him in, stabbing blindly at the button for some lower level. They descended a floor or two before Steve slammed the red emergency stop with his fist. “What have you _done_ to yourself?” Steve exploded, his voice teetering on the edge of hysteria, possibly even tears.

“Calm down, Steve, it’s--” Tony gave a ladylike hiccup, “--it’s only temporary.”

“Temporary?!”

“ _Yes,_ temporary. It was, I don’t know, some sort of gag booze that Sif had. You should see Thor’s tits. They’re humongous. Waaay bigger than mine. But the effects only last as long as the buzz, and I only had a sip. I’ll be back * _hic_ * swinging my dick by morning.”

“But, Tony, what were you _thinking_?” Steve wailed.

“Are you kidding? Have you seen these things?” Tony spread his hands over his soft, round breasts and laughed, “It’s terrific! And besides,” his voice dropped to a bedroom purr, “I thought this would be a fun model for you to test drive.” And then Tony actually had the audacity to wink. 

“I know,” Steve put a hand to his brow, trying hard not to lose it, “that you didn’t just suggest we--because that would be . . . I can’t even--”

“Oh, come on,” Tony scoffed and flipped his long brown hair over his shoulder, “Don’t tell me you aren’t curious. Fuck,” he hiccuped again, “I know I’m curious.”

Steve finally snapped, grabbing Tony’s narrow shoulders, just as he promised himself he wouldn’t do, “Tony, listen to me. There is nothing, _nothing_ that I am so curious about that I would willingly drink magic potion at a Halloween party. I can’t believe you--”

“Now wait just a minute there, Spangles,” Tony rounded on Steve, jabbing a finger into Steve’s chest, “Of the two of us in this elevator, who is in fact _famous_ for willingly drinking magic fucking potion? You need a hint? Surprise, Cap! It’s you! _You’re_ the one that went from ninety-eight pound weakling to beefcake in point-seven seconds, and you went fucking _permanently_. And now you’re angry at me for trying out tits for a couple hours?”

“That was--that was completely different,” Steve sputtered, feeling himself going red in the face. “You know I didn’t drink--it was the War! It wasn’t something I did for fun, Tony. It was something I did for my country, for--”

“Yeah, yeah, save the speech for the constituents. I’ve heard it already,” Tony said, rolling his eyes, “And to think I always heard a girl could get it whenever she wants.” 

Steve released Tony’s shoulders with a furious groan. Tony was impossible. Why couldn’t he understand how stupid, how dangerous--Steve could feel a rising tide of anger and fear in his throat. He felt, he felt--

“Steve,” Tony said carefully, the first faint note of doubt creeping into his high, unfamiliar voice, “Steve, you’re hyperventilating.” 

Tony was right; he was hyperventilating, and, suddenly, he also felt like he might pass out or vomit or both. Steve doubled over with his hands on his knees and squeezed his eyes shut. 

“Steve?” Tony, or at least what passed for Tony these days, placed a small, tentative hand onto his shoulder, “I-- you okay?”

The touch of that tiny, feminine hand was too much. Steve slid all the way down the elevator wall to sit on the carpeted floor. “Give me a minute,” he wheezed, pressing his face into his drawn-up knees. He sucked in a slow breath, then tipped his head back against the wall, looking squarely at his new Tony. “Okay,” he said, as much to himself as to Tony, and as calmly and commandingly as he could, “This--It’s temporary. You said it’s temporary; I’ll assume it is. You’re drunk, and you’re going to go to sleep it off. All of it.” 

As for Steve, he would try to sleep off the urge to strangle Tony with his bare hands. 

**************************************************

Steve pulled away from Tony’s hand, sinking to the floor, and now Tony felt as though he were slowly sinking, too. Tony had fully intended to take Steve’s breath away, just in a crazy, sexy, taboo sort of way instead of a furious, horrified, hyperventilation sort of way. If someone had told Tony five minutes ago that he would be dragged bodily into an elevator by Steve Rogers, he would have assumed all was going to plan. In Tony’s experience, ninety-nine times out of one hundred, being dragged onto an elevator was the first stop along the road to getting laid. But this . . . seemed to be shaping up to be one of those ‘one out of a hundred times’ instead.

He hadn’t hesitated when he’d been offered the little glass bottle from Sif’s leather bag. Lady Thor was a fucking knockout, built like a brick house with enormous breasts and gold hair to the waist. Sif, on the other hand, instantly grew a beard like a long-lost member of ZZ Topp, and they’d had a terrific laugh. And then it’d been Tony’s turn. 

“A great beauty!” Thor declared, pulling him into a bathroom so Tony could look at himself in a mirror. Tony ran a finger along the delicate point of his chin, the new pout of his lips, the silken arch of his eyebrow. His features had transmogrified nicely into something not unlike Vivian Leigh: sharp, sly, and feline. He felt his stomach flutter, full of happy butterflies: he couldn’t wait to see Steve. He had a vision of Steve’s big hands around his tiny curve of waist, fingers spread wide across Tony’s soft skin. Tony could almost feel Steve’s mouth pressed to his neck, and the imagined tickle of Steve’s beard made him shiver. 

The shiver was accompanied by a second sensation, something entirely new, subtle and alien, a blossom of heat spreading inexorably in all directions from some place between Tony’s thighs. He could feel it now in his chest as a tremulous excitement, in his limbs as a delicious tingle. He felt pleasantly light-headed, and there was a low-level buzz of white noise in his ears. And, most of all, there was his growing awareness of a dull but pleasurable ache somewhere deep inside him, an unaccountable need to be filled. It was weird. It was hot. And holy shit, his panties were wet--well, his boxer-briefs, anyway. 

He strode out of the bathroom, feeling both aroused and pleased with himself, his two favorite feelings. He decided he needed a grand entrance, something that would make Steve’s heart stop. That was just about the time he noticed the karaoke machine. 

“Hey, hey,” he snagged the elbow of a passing pin-up girl with bright red lips, “can I borrow your lipstick?” 

Which was how he had ended up here, lips slathered in Ruby Woo, watching Captain America hyperventilating on the floor of an elevator, and realizing, with a dawning horror, that he had royally, majorly, seriously fucked up.

“Steve,” Tony’s voice sounded small, even in his own ears, “what--what do you want me to do here?” 

“You know, Tony,” Steve said, with a humorless little snort that shot straight through Tony’s guts, “I really think you’ve done enough.” He tipped his face to the ceiling, “Jarvis?”

“Yes, Captain.”

“Is there an empty guest room?”

“Yes, Captain. The 67th floor suite is unoccupied.”

“Take us there. And then page an Asgardian and send them down pronto.” There was a pregnant pause. “Jarvis?” Steve asked warily.

“The Asgardians are . . . no longer here, Captain,” Jarvis almost sounded apologetic, “It seems they have departed for an unknown location. I will inform you should I receive any indication as to their whereabouts. Shall I still take you to the guest suite, Captain?”

Steve sighed, “Yes, Jarvis, I guess you’d better.”

As the elevator once again stirred to life, Steve’s eyes remained fixed on the ceiling tiles, looking determinedly not at Tony, and they descended smoothly downward in silence. The doors hissed open on a dark apartment. Tony extended a hand down to Steve on the floor, but Steve pointedly ignored it, standing on his own and then striding wordlessly into the shadowy living room, leaving Tony to trail after.

Steve sat heavily on the big sofa, peeled off his hat, ran a hand through his hat hair, and then aggressively tugged off his boots, dropping them to the floor with a thud. Tony edged towards the sofa, trying to catch Steve’s expression in the darkness, but Steve wouldn’t look at him, instead punching at a throw pillow harder than strictly necessary to make an indent for his head. He stretched full-length along the couch, staring fixedly at the ceiling. 

“Steve--”

“Go to bed, Tony,” Steve’s voice was brittle. 

“But--”

“Go to bed.” 

Steve’s tone was not one which brooked argument. Tony’s face closed, and he slouched wordlessly to the bedroom. The room felt big and dark and anonymous as Tony fell back gently against the door, closing it with a soft click. He undressed in darkness and, even then, it was painful, an embarrassment. His whole body felt like a practical joke gone wrong. He didn’t want to touch himself, not even to undress, and he was careful not to let his hands linger as he pulled off his clothes. He felt like the absolute opposite of sexy, a -50 on the Richter arousal scale.

He let his clothes drop to the floor and crawled naked into the bed, pulling the cold sheets up all the way to his chin. To his dismay, his nipples stiffened under the slide of the cold cotton, so he flopped over on his stomach, burying his face in the pillow, willing his body to just--just--liquefy or implode or dematerialize or something. Anything. 

Fuck. Not only did he have tits, but Tony also realized that, even squished face-first into a pillow, the darkness was revolving around him. Not quickly or nausea-inducingly (well, not yet), but the room was definitely spinning slowly on an alcoholic axis. He tried to think if he’d had any water (Did ice count?), but, really, he just shouldn’t be this drunk. Yes, sure, he’d had something or other in his hand all night, but he’d kept it at the level of steady drip rather than binge. At least he thought he had.

“Jarvis,” he said, straight into the pillow, “I think I’m drunk. Like, really drunk. And I shouldn’t be this drunk. Like, mathematically shouldn’t.”

“Sir, you are currently over the legal limit in all fifty states, as well as Canada, Mexico, Uruguay--”

“Thanks, yeah. I got it. So not helpful. How much did I _actually drink_?” 

“Sir, you consumed 4 whiskey sours and a martini, totaling approximately six standard servings of liquor, plus small quantities of several alien beverages of unknown chemical composition and potency.”

“Yeah, but over, what? Like, six or seven hours, right?”

“Your present blood alcohol concentration stands at 0.13%.”

“What?” His face came out of the pillow from sheer force of shock. The room was gaining momentum now and had begun to tilt, “How?” 0.13? That wasn’t right, couldn’t possibly--

“At your present weight and rate of alcohol metabolism--”

“Oh, fuuuuuuck,” Tony moaned through gritted teeth, and subsided back face-first into the pillow. He was totally shit-faced. He’d been drinking with the big boys and now he was a big girl instead. He felt suddenly exhausted. And the hang-over, he had no doubt, was going to be absolutely brutal. “Jarvis,” he muttered into the stuffing.

“Sir?” 

“Tell Steve to--” he trailed off. Tell Steve to, to what? Bring an aspirin? A glass of water? He could see Steve’s face on the elevator, stricken with anger and fear. A hangover seemed preferable to asking for Steve’s help. Hell, more than that--a hangover seemed like the least penance he deserved for upsetting Steve. In the tilting darkness, Tony shut his eyes tight and waited, alone, to fall asleep. In the morning, he knew, he would be sick and repentant, but Steve would see how pitiful he was and, following a protracted lecture about personal risk, all would be forgiven. It would be fine, Tony told himself, as he drifted off. It would all be fine. 

*********************************************************

Steve spent a couple of hostile, anxious minutes on the sofa, alternatingly cursing at and praying for Tony, and alternatingly cursing at and praying for himself _._ Tony’s latest escapade was so far beyond the realm of usual stupidity that it boggled the mind, and Tony hadn’t pushed Steve’s buttons in the elevator so much as ground them in with a knuckle. _Spangles._ Steve snorted. On the other hand, Steve hadn’t been so nice either. He was pretty sure Tony had been about to apologize when he’d issued the order for Tony to go to bed in his firmest do-not-pass-go, do-not-collect-$200 tone. Yes, Steve admitted to himself, his other cheek had remained staunchly un-turned.

More than anything, Steve just wanted to fall asleep, skip over the current tortuous period of uncertainty, and wake up with Tony back to normal, or at least as back to normal as Tony ever came. He’d accept Tony’s apology graciously then, make an apology of his own. But sleep was impossible, even though he felt exhausted, and he gave up.

In his sock feet, he crept to the bedroom door, laid his ear flat against it. Tony had been pretty smashed, and when Steve didn’t hear anything, he was confident that Tony had fallen asleep. He stood at the door a long time, wracked with indecision. On the one hand, he really wanted to check on Tony. On the other hand, he really didn’t. Tony’s current . . . state-of-being was upsetting Steve in a way that was hard to articulate. He’d been to a show once at the Museum of Modern Art, weird stuff, a teacup and a saucer wrapped with fur, an iron bifurcated by a line of little tacks running down it’s face. There had been a painting, too, a detailed but ultimately workmanlike landscape, unremarkable except for the fact that something about it made his skin crawl. He’d spent a long time with it, first staring at it from across the gallery, then moving close enough to make the guard cough meaningfully. Finally, at a middle distance, he began to notice the distorted faces in the trees, the fact that the rolling hills in the background were actually a pair of disembodied lips. He’d read a little Freud in art school, enough to know that _uncanny_ was the word to describe the painting’s particular brand of the creeps. _Uncanny_ was probably the way he’d describe Tony now, too, an uneasy blend of _someone_ he knew intimately and _something_ that was entirely strange. Tony was the teacup wrapped in fur.

Steve took one more deep breath and held it while he turned the knob, creeping from the dark of the living room into the deeper dark of the bedroom. He eased the door almost shut behind himself and walked gingerly towards the bed. Tony was sleeping face down, as he usually did, despite his claim that it caused wrinkles. The sheets were pulled all the way up over Tony’s shoulders, but the coverage did not allow Steve to fool himself for even a second that things were as they should be. The shoulders were too narrow, the overall figure in the bed much too small. Moving slowly, as if he were underwater, Steve sat onto the edge of the bed, right beside the sleeping figure. _Tony_ , he told himself. He stopped breathing as he slipped his phone from his shirt pocket and thumbed the screen. He angled the rectangle of light to shine on Tony’s face. He ( _she_?) frowned a little in sleep, but did not wake, and Steve finally released a stale breath. 

He studied Tony in the rectangle of blue light. Tony’s laugh lines were in the same place Steve had left them. The nose was vaguely familiar but a little too small. The chin was narrower, and the eyebrows were higher, though the long dark lashes had stayed just the same. The hair was too long, of course, but Steve wondered if--? With two fingers, Steve carefully brushed back a lock that had fallen across Tony’s forehead. Maybe it was wishful thinking, but it seemed to Steve like it was the right weight, the correct degree of softness. Impulsively, he leaned forward, close enough for his nose to graze the top of Tony’s head. He inhaled deeply. He didn’t consciously know what Tony was supposed to smell like exactly. He couldn’t wax poetic about Tony’s particular musk or essence or whatever, but Steve was damn sure he’d know if Tony smelled _wrong_ . He didn’t smell wrong. _She_ didn’t smell wrong? _Tony_ didn’t smell wrong. Tony smelled like Tony.

“Huh,” Steve whispered to himself, “How about that?”

Feeling somehow comforted, Steve pressed the button on his phone to darken the screen. Surprising himself, he stroked Tony’s hair as he rose from the bed, then shuffled his way back into the living room.

He wanted to pace or compulsively search the internet for some indication that the Asgardians had turned up somewhere, but he made himself lie down on the sofa instead. He deliberately powered off his phone. He was out of practice willing himself to sleep, but if he’d managed to doze in front line trenches with bombs going off, he could make himself sleep now, at least for a few hours. It wouldn’t do anyone any good to stay awake all night. Either Tony would sleep and clear his system or he wouldn’t. Either Jarvis would receive some intel about Thor and the others or he wouldn’t. At this point, there was nothing productive Steve could do but wait. In the morning, there could be decisions to make. Better to have a cool head.

Steve closed his eyes and concentrated hard on sheep, but his mind kept slipping inexorably backwards to that once-upon-a-time exhibition at MoMA and a taxidermied parrot wearing an artificial limb.


	2. I Was a Fool (But Now I Understand)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things are always better in the morning, except when they aren't.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from Madonna's song 'One More Chance.'

The headache began the second Tony sat up, followed immediately thereafter by the urgent need to vomit. He half-staggered, half-ran to the bathroom, flipped on the light, and threw himself to the floor in front of the toilet. His knees hit the tile hard enough to bruise, but the more pressing concern was the torrent of booze-flavored bile pouring out of his mouth.  _ Fuck _ . He hadn’t been this hungover in years.

It was worse than he remembered: the tile felt like hell under his middle-aged knees, and the vomit was sticky and smelled sour in his hair. A cold, clammy feeling crawled over Tony, and it only had so much to do with the alcohol gushing out his stomach like water from a fire hose. _Wait_ \--his mind screeched to a halt. There shouldn’t be vomit in his hair because his hair didn’t hang in front of his face. It shouldn’t be dragging in the toilet water. He wasn’t fucking Alice Cooper. He didn’t fucking have long hair. In the brief lull between one bout of nausea and the next, Tony chanced a look down at his body--at the soft, protruding mounds of tissue on either side of the arc reactor, and the distinct lack of protruding tissue between his aching knees. _Fuuuuuuuck_ , he thought, vomiting again, fingers in a white-knuckle clench on the edge of the toilet bowl. And really, ‘fuck’ did not even begin to cover it.

He threw up the rest of the alcohol, dry-heaved a few times for good measure, and then collapsed into a little ball on the bathroom floor, knees pulled up to his chest tight enough that he could feel the press of breasts against his thighs. He squeezed his eyes shut against both the light and a sudden, terrifying rush of hypotheticals. What if he were stuck like this forever? Would he get kicked off the board? Off the Avengers? Would that be discrimination? Could he sue? Would he sue?

Would Steve divorce him? Would Steve still love him?

_ No. _ He clamped down hard on that line of thinking. He was still metabolizing the alcohol in his system, including whatever shit he’d gotten from Sif. Honestly, who knew how long it took for human livers to process alien booze? He just had to stay calm and wait it out. And, given the way he felt, he would probably wait it out right here, curled up in the fetal position on the bathroom floor. Just the thought of trying to make it back to the bed made him want to hurl, and the chill tile felt oddly soothing against his naked, fevered skin. 

He just had to wait it out. It would be fine.

The alternative was too terrible to contemplate.

*********************************************************

At about 7:30, Steve heard Tony’s feet hit the floor at a run. With his ear pressed once again to the bedroom door, Steve had listened to Tony vomiting his guts up, followed by total silence, which meant Tony was lying on the bathroom floor, naked and sick, needing water and aspirin and a helping hand back to bed. It did not matter what his body looked like, what his voice sounded like, Steve told himself. Tony needed help, and it was Steve’s job to provide it. It was his duty as a husband. This, he thought, collecting himself, was one of those for better or worse times, and he would see it through. With newfound resolve, he retrieved some supplies from the kitchen and, screwing his courage to the sticking place, entered the bedroom. 

With the blackout curtains drawn, the bedroom was very dark, with just a sliver of light eking out from under the door to the bath. Steve set a water bottle and three aspirin on the bedside table, anticipating a need for free hands, and went to rap gently on the bathroom door.

“Tony?” No response. He tried the knob and, in his mind, began throwing up a fervent prayer to God and the Virgin Mary and Saint Michael and anyone else he thought might be listening in. The door was unlocked, and he eased it open, blood rushing in his ears. It was just possible that everything was back to normal. It was  _ possible _ that in the last five minutes Tony had thrown up  _ whatever _ , that Steve was going to find him back in the right body, that the worst thing he’d have to contend with that behind that door would be whiny, headache-y Tony. Maybe he’d be lying on the floor, blue-black five o'clock shadow spreading around his carefully trimmed beard, eyes bloodshot, hungover, with (blessedly) no memory of last night at all. Maybe,  _ maybe _ \--no. The prayers Steve was sending fizzled out. As Steve feared, there he was (she was?), crumpled up on the floor, long dark hair spread across the white porcelain tile.

“Yes, Steve,” Tony said croakily, eyes closed, face pressed to knees, “I still have tits. And I feel like shit. And, after you bring me a coffee, I’ll even let you say ‘I told you so.’”

_ Nope _ , Steve finally decided, shaking his head. Tony was still ‘he,’ because breasts or no breasts, that was definitely his husband curled up on the floor. In all the world, only Tony could manage that particular degree of flippancy under these circumstances.

“You can even say it now _ and _ later,” Tony’s dark eyes opened, and he tipped up his narrow face, “if the coffee comes with an aspirin.”

“How about a bottle of water first?” Steve said, and was relieved that his voice, at least, sounded normal. He crouched down and, tentatively, picked up the tiny ball of Tony, holding him close to his chest. Against his forearms, Steve could feel the layer of cold sweat all over Tony’s body and the faint shiver twitching Tony’s frame. “Tony, you’re freezing.” 

“Yeah, well, hangover sweat and a tile floor will do that to you,” Tony said as Steve deposited him back in the bed and pulled the covers up over Tony’s naked breasts, “That and blind terror.”

“Blind terror, huh?” Steve handed him the aspirin and the water bottle, willing himself to focus on Tony’s words and not the voice or vessel.

“Oh, yeah.” Tony swallowed the pills before subsiding back against the pillows, eyes closed. “Total and complete panic.”

“That you’ll be stuck like this?” Steve sat down gently on the edge of the bed.

“Honestly, more that I’ll be stuck like this and that you’ll divorce me and then take all my money and never talk to me again.” Tony’s eyes remained resolutely closed during this admission, and while he tried to sound flip, Steve knew better. Steve sighed.

“Tony,” he said, reaching for the lump under the covers that he knew was Tony’s hand, “look at me, please.” Tony opened his eyes, and they were exactly the eyes that Steve knew so well. “You’re not going to be stuck like this.” Tony swallowed hard and looked away. “But,” Steve continued gently, “even if you  _ were _ , I would never, ever leave you. Ever. You’re stuck with me.” 

Tony sniffled, turning back with wet eyes. “Yeah? You sure? ‘Cause if you’re gonna want alimony, I need to call my attorney.”

“I’m sure.”

“You're still mad at me, though, right?” 

Steve considered this question. He let his eyes run over the strange face in the bed, an uncanny blend of the known eyes set into foreign planes. It was, in so many ways, the face of a stranger, but it wore an achingly familiar expression of vulnerability. It was not, in the end, a face he could be angry with. He felt a hidden knot of tension fall out from somewhere, and he felt a release in his shoulders, in his chest.

“No,” he said honestly, “not really. Not anymore.” 

And it seemed like a good time to prove it. He stood up and leaned over the bed, bringing their mouths together. Well, almost.

*********************************************************

Steve was going to kiss him. Which was wonderful. The most wonderful thing that Tony could possibly imagine. Tony loved kissing Steve. Kissing Steve felt simultaneously like coming home, finally, after a long, long time  _ and  _ like embarking on an adventure. He loved kissing Steve so much that sometimes he would randomly look at other people in the world and feel smug pity for them because  _ they _ would never know the joy of kissing Steve Rogers.  _ Lady with teeny dog in purse? Will never kiss Steve Rogers. That guy buying a coffee? Will never kiss Steve Rogers.  _ Kissing Captain America was the most reassuring and esteem-boosting activity that Tony could think of and, at that moment, Tony sure felt like he needed both. 

Which meant it came as much of a shock to Tony as it did to Steve when he turned his face away, presenting Steve with a cheek instead of his mouth. It wasn’t a conscious decision, not really; it was an animal reaction to a sudden, overwhelming swell of anxiety.

He saw Steve blink in the corner of his eye, nonplussed, but he recovered almost immediately. He didn’t even kiss Tony’s cheek, steering his lips instead to the shell of Tony’s ear. 

“I love you, Tony,” he whispered, almost too softly to hear, then straightened, “Alright. I’m going to make some coffee and get dressed upstairs. I’ll get Jarvis to tell you when I’m headed back down.”

_ Oh, shit. Don’t leave,  _ Tony thought, but he could feel himself nodding.

“Okay. I’ll be back. Call me if you need anything.”

_ Stop nodding! Let me explain. _

Steve was already out the door, in the very act of pulling it shut behind him. It was now or never.  _ I’m sorry,  _ Tony wanted to say,  _ I’m freaking out. I want to unzip my skin. This is easily the stupidest thing I’ve ever done, and I have done sooooo many stupid things . . .  _

“Steve!” he blurted. Steve stopped, peered around the door, eyebrows raised expectantly. “I--”  _ Make with the apology _ , Tony screamed in his head. What came out was: “Don’t tell anybody.”

Steve made a face, a horrible, quintessentially Steve face that managed to combine tenderness, compassion, disappointment, and worry in equal amounts, and made Tony feel unbelievably guilty. 

“I don’t think that’s . . .” Steve sighed, relented, “Okay. I won’t. Not today, anyway.” Then he closed the bedroom door with a soft click. 

Tony felt sick and disgusted with himself. As soon as the door closed, he began to count down. Twenty seconds should get Steve onto the elevator, he reasoned, and when those twenty seconds had elapsed, Tony bolted out of the bed. After a reeling moment of nausea, he retrieved his boxer briefs from the pool of his expensive pants and pulled them on, then began to ransack the dresser. All the guest suites were stocked with some basics for unexpected overnight guests, and the drawers yielded sweatpants and a t-shirt in short order. They were both oversized, but when he briefly considered his reflection in the mirror, they didn’t swamp him the way he wanted. He wanted a mumu, a full tent, but the voluminous jersey had a clingy drape, and there was absolutely no way he would tolerate even a hint of visible nipple.

He opened and then slammed shut another series of drawers, catching hanging ends of his long hair at least twice. His long hair that still sorta-kinda smelled like vomit.  _ Fuck _ . He really needed a shower, but he didn’t think he could face nakedness again, not right now, particularly if it involved scrubbing parts of his anatomy that he was trying to will into non-existence with every fucking breath.  _ Please _ , he pleaded with the universe at large, _ please fix this before bathing becomes mission critical or I have to pee sitting down. _

He found a drawer filled with thick hoodies. He selected one in black, hoping it was sufficiently box-like for his purposes. He zipped it up, put up the hood. He chanced another look in the mirror and felt slightly relieved. Behind the oversized black bulk, he could be anyone, anything. If he squinted, he could even pass for himself.

He grabbed the water bottle off the bedside table and then opened the bedroom door a tiny, tiny crack. The suite was empty, as he expected, so he scuttled into the elevator and pressed the button for the floor of his private shop. It had a sofa and a coffee maker and, most importantly, a locking door.  __ He couldn’t face Steve when he came back with the coffee and the  _ concern _ , he just couldn’t. He was going to camp out and watch bad television until such a time that the physical manifestation of his unbelievable stupidity disappeared. It couldn’t take more than a few more hours. He felt like shit, but dread was making him sober up fast.

_ Please _ , he thought, as the elevator lurched to life,  _ please don’t let me puke in here _ . 

*********************************************************

Steve chewed his lip in the elevator, considering. He had decided to take his time upstairs; Tony clearly needed some space, and maybe, if Tony spent long enough waiting for coffee, he’d actually drink some water.  _ Maybe _ , he caught himself thinking for the hundredth time,  _ if I take long enough, he’ll just be normal by the time I get back. _ And maybe he would be. Steve wasn’t going to write the possibility off completely; he was an optimist. But eight hours in, he was also beginning to consider other scenarios. What if Tony needed some kind of . . . magic antidote? And what if they couldn’t get in contact with Thor or his friends to get it? Sometimes, Thor was unreachable for months at a time. How long should they let this problem try to solve itself before they called a doctor? How long before they needed to inform the team? Steve wasn’t sure himself, but he suspected that, for Tony, the answers involved some variations on ‘infinity’ and ‘never.’ Which meant, unless everything magically (literally magically) sorted itself out in the next 24 hours, Tony was going to force his hand. It made him feel grim. 

The elevator arrived at the penthouse, and the doors slid open to reveal post-party Armageddon: worse-for-wear decorations, misplaced costume pieces, dirty dishes, and sticky glasses on every flat surface. Thank god there didn’t seem to be any hungover guests among the wreckage. 

There was, however, Bruce. He had unearthed an armchair from the landfill that used to be the living room and was having a cup of coffee and reading the New York Times Book Review. His lab coat from the previous evening was neatly folded over the arm of the chair. It was clearly an ambush.

“Bruce,” Steve said by way of greeting.

Bruce smiled and put down his paper, “Good morning. I made coffee. It’s pretty fresh.” His face was more hang-dog than usual, and he didn’t look like he’d shaved. Up all night, probably. “Hey, I hope you don’t mind that I helped myself to your paper.”

“Not unless you did my crossword.”

“What kind of monster do you think I am?” Bruce asked genially, trailing Steve into the big chrome kitchen. Steve could feel himself being watched as he poured a cup of coffee for himself, added some cream from the fridge. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but how does the crossword go for you?”

“You mean, how does the crossword go for a guy who’s been frozen in ice and missed sixty years worth of television? About like you’d expect.” Steve paused, tasting his coffee. “So,” he conversationally veered, “ _ you _ don’t take this the wrong way, but exactly what are you doing here?”

“Uninvited, in your apartment, at seven thirty in the morning?’”

“Right.”

“Uh, brunch?”

Steve laughed and rolled his eyes,“Try again.”

Bruce chuffed out a laugh himself and rubbed the back of his neck,“Well,” he said reluctantly, “that’s sorta hard to explain. The short answer? I had this idea that you might need a doctor.”

“You did, huh?” Steve kept his face carefully neutral, but, inside, he could feel a little blip of something, hope or relief maybe. Tony didn't want anyone to know about his current predicament, would maybe never forgive Steve for telling anyone about it, but if by some sort of miracle Bruce already  _ knew _ \-- “What’s the long answer?”

Bruce sucked his teeth and adopted the pained expression of someone who is picking their words one by one, “You left sort of abruptly last night with that woman--heh, I say ‘woman,’--that  _ person--”  _ Bruce paused and looked closely at Steve, clearly hoping for some encouragement, but Steve just lifted his eyebrows. Bruce continued, “When you never came back, I started noticing that Tony was gone, too, and  _ he _ never came back and that, er,  _ person _ never came back, either--feel free to stop me here, Steve, and tell me it’s none of my business.”

“It’s none of your business,” Steve said, not missing a beat, “Now, keep talking.” Steve struggled to keep his suddenly acute level of expectation off his face.

“Well,” Bruce continued, even more reluctantly than before, as if he had to actually pry each word out of his own mouth, “then I realized that the person you’d dragged into the elevator had been wearing a suit that looked a lot like Tony’s. I mean _a lot_ like Tony’s, minus the jacket, and--hold on--” Bruce disappeared into the living room, reappearing a moment later with a Zegna suit jacket. He held it up for Steve’s inspection. In the front pocket, there was a bat-patterned pocket square. Bruce watched Steve’s face, but when Steve said nothing, he draped it on the counter. “I also found this under the edge of the DJ platform.” Bruce dug in his shirt pocket, extending a closed fist. 

When Steve presented his cupped palm, a thick gold ring dropped into it. Steve didn’t need to look at it, but he did anyway, turning it between his thumb and forefinger until the single inset ruby was staring him in the face. Tony’s wedding ring. Steve felt a stab of _something_ in his chest accompanied by a little surge of heat behind his eyes. Unbidden, he could feel the ghost of Tony’s hand, the warm weight of it resting on his own. He could feel the slide of the gold ring over Tony’s finger, the slight resistance as it caught on Tony’s square mechanic’s knuckle. But that wasn’t Tony’s hand now, was it? The big square knuckle meant to hold back this ring had been magicked into the ether, leaving the heavy band to drop unnoticed to the floor. Were Tony’s calluses still there? Steve suddenly wondered. Was the nail on Tony’s right hand still torn from working on that car? _Damn it_ , _get it together_ , Steve chided himself. He had thought he was done being upset, thought he’d moved on from the feeling of crisis to the management of crisis. Bruce cleared his throat, and Steve shook himself, jamming the ring deep in the front pocket of his pants.

“Those are Tony’s, right?”

Steve only managed a curt nod.

“So,” Bruce continued slowly, “I know Tony was drinking with the Asgard crowd, and I know this is going to sound crazy, but did Tony maybe, accidentally, I dunno, drink some sort of alien hooch that turned him into a woman?”

“That is crazy, Bruce,” Steve agreed, “but then again,” he shrugged, “aliens invaded New York City.”

“I turn into a big green rage monster."

“Norse gods came to the Halloween party. It’s a crazy world,” Steve agreed. There was a moment of silence while Bruce looked at the floor, nudging at a scatter of glitter with the toe of his sneaker.

“So, just to be clear, what you’re saying,” Bruce said to his foot, “is that Tony  _ didn’t  _ accidentally drink magic potion or something?”

Steve took a big inhale through his nose, like he was about to take a dive. And he was. This was it. The clutch. He could bring Bruce in, enlist an ally, or he could lie. He could give Tony more time. He tried to do the emotional calculus, but gave up and went with his gut, “No. That isn’t what I’m saying. What I’m saying is he did it on purpose.”

Bruce looked up sharply from the sparkles now clinging to his shoe, his mouth hanging open, faintly disbelieving even as Steve confirmed his own hypothesis.

“He drank it on purpose, Bruce,” As much as he tried to keep it out, there was a trace of something desperate in Steve’s voice, “And so far, he’s been  _ stuck _ that way.”

Bruce blinked owlishly. “Hmmm,” he said finally. “So . . . you gonna try to get Tony to come to the lab, or should I make a house call?” And Steve loved him dearly for the under-reaction.

“I know you’ll need to do tests, but dragging him to the lab right now would involve a lot of kicking and screaming.”

“I can do a physical exam wherever you guys are holed up.”

“Will that be useful?”

“It would answer some basic questions that I have.” 

Steve decided immediately not to ask what those were. He scratched his beard, considering. Tony wasn’t going to like this, but Steve suspected he’d be much more cooperative after he got over the initial mortifying fact that Bruce knew about his predicament. He might even be relieved; Steve sure was. They needed a medical professional on this, and they needed one now, not 24 or 48 hours from now.

“Jarvis,” Steve said, “Tell Tony I’m headed back down in five minutes. Bruce, go get your kit.”

“Not gonna mention I’m coming?” Bruce asked uneasily.

“We’re going for the element of surprise.” Steve moved back towards the coffee pot to pour Tony a cup when Jarvis broke in.

“Captain Rogers,” Jarvis said, with something like mild embarrassment, “Regarding your return visit to the guest suite, I have been . . . instructed to say that Sir is out of the building.”

Steve plunked the coffee pot down and looked at the ceiling, “Run that by me one more time.”

“Yes, Captain. I have been instructed to say that Sir is out of the building.”

“Interesting phraseology,” Bruce observed mildly.

Steve braced his arms against the counter and let his head fall forward between his shoulders. “Jarvis,” he said tiredly, “have you also been instructed to revoke my entry privileges to Tony’s shop?”

There was a moment of hesitation before the reply, “I am not at liberty to say, Captain.”

Well, there was a non-answer answer. Steve rolled his eyes. Hand it to Tony to find a way to complicate a pre-existing crisis. Here Steve had started planning an ambush, and it was shaping up to be a siege. 

**Author's Note:**

> The exhibit that Steve attended at MoMA was real. It was titled Fantastic Art, Dada, Surrealism and was held at the museum from 1936-1937. Here is a link to the catalogue, if you are so inclined: https://assets.moma.org/documents/moma_catalogue_2823_300061909.pdf


End file.
